A Sketch of the History,
Greatness and Dangers of America
by John Lord, LL.D.

Author of "Beacon Lights of History," etc.

It would be difficult to point out an event in the history of the world followed by more important results, certainly in a material and political aspect, than the discovery of America by Christopher Columbus; and as centuries and years roll on, these results appear greater and grander, so that no human intellect can grasp the mighty issues which perpetually arise to view. How little did the great discoverer anticipate the consequences of his adventuresome voyages! How little conscious was he of the boon he rendered to civilization and the human race! It was too great to be measured by any ordinary human services.

Nearly a century passed away before the European mind began to appreciate the true import of the discovery. Columbus himself did not imagine the blessings which he had almost unconsciously bestowed. He had no idea even that he had given a new world to Ferdinand and Isabella. He supposed at first that he had reached the eastern shores of Asia—the Zipango of Marco Polo; that he had solved a great geographical problem of vast commercial importance, and was entitled to high reward. Yet it had been the Old and not the New that he was seeking; while it was the New, that has made memorable the year of our Lord 1492.

In taking this introductory glance at the history of four hundred years, which Prof. Patton has told in detail, we wish but to mark a few of the great events, the great men and the great elements that have contributed to make that history most notable in the life of the modern world.

It was not long after Columbus, before the Spaniards, the Portuguese, the English, the Dutch and the French perceived that something strange had been discovered, and successive voyages made it clear that a new continent had really been opened to the enterprise of European nations; that it was rich in mines of gold and silver; that they had only to take possession of it by hoisting a national flag. They found, as their explorations extended, that this new continent was peopled by entirely unknown races, in various stages of barbarism or savagery, whose languages no one could understand—tribes inclined to be friendly and peaceable, but revengeful and treacherous if treated unjustly and unkindly. All the various tribes from Mexico to Canada had the same general peculiarities of feature and color, different from any known type in Asia or Africa. What was the origin of this strange race? Were they aborigines, or did their remote ancestors come from Asia? Their whole history is involved in hopeless mystery.

Peaceful relations were not long kept up between the natives and the adventurers who sought the new world with the primary view of improving their fortunes. Hence the first century of American history is the record of conflicts with Indians, of injustice and cruelty, producing deadly animosities on both sides, until the natives were conquered and nearly exterminated.

There were few permanent settlements, but there was great zeal in explorations, in which Vespuccius, Ponce de Leon, the Cabots, Cartier, De Soto and other famous captains and navigators distinguished themselves, who, on their return home, reported lands of mineral wealth, natural fertility and great beauty, but uncultivated and sparsely populated. This led to a great emigration of adventurers, chiefly for working the mines. The result was the enrichment of Spain, but not a healthy colonization on the part of that or any other European nation.

Nor was the second century of North American history fruitful in those movements and characters which have much interest to the present generation, except that it was the period of colonization.

Noting particularly the English and French settlements, the first in importance was that of Virginia under the patronage of James I of England. He gave to his favorites and courtiers immense territories. He also gave charters to companies of merchants and others more or less favored, who hoped to be enriched, not by mines of gold and silver, but by the culture of tobacco through African slaves. The first settlement was at Jamestown, 1607, made chiefly by sanguine adventurers, most of whom were broken-down gentlemen, or younger sons of noble families, who did not know how to work. They were so unfortunate also as to quarrel with the Indians. In consequence they were molested, discouraged and helpless, and their numbers dwindled away by sickness and famine. Though continually reinforced by new arrivals, the Colony did not thrive. In two years the able-bodied men numbered only about two hundred, and only forty acres of land were brought under cultivation. The Colonists were idle and dissolute. When John Smith, who led the first settlers, returned to England discouraged, there were only sixty men left out of the four hundred and ninety who had arrived at different times. In 1612, under Sir Thomas Gates, three hundred additional Colonists arrived, and year after year their number was again increased, and yet in twelve years the settlement contained no more than six hundred persons. At last the Company in England sent over one hundred and fifty respectable young women who became wives of the Colonists, and a better day dawned. In 1619, the London Company granted to the people the right to make their own laws, and the Houses of Burgesses became the first legislative assembly in the New World, and enacted laws in favor of industry, virtue and good order. In a few years the population of the colony numbered nearly four thousand, chiefly employed in the cultivation of tobacco, then worth on the London docks six shillings a pound. But the people were not all voters. Only those who possessed a landed estate had the right of suffrage. The aristocratic organization of the Colony was not unfavorable to property, since the demand for tobacco continually increased. In a hundred years Virginia was the richest and most populous of the North American colonies; ruled by planters who resembled the county gentlemen of England in their habits, their sentiments and their pride. In religion they were Episcopalians, and in their social life they were aristocrats who disdained manual labor, which was done by African slaves.

The next event of importance in American Colonial history was the settlement of New England, by a different class of men, who sought a home in the wilderness to escape religious persecution. In 1620 the Pilgrim Fathers landed at Plymouth. I need not dwell on their lofty sentiments, their fervent piety, the privation and sufferings they cheerfully endured, exposed to innumerable dangers, which developed among them extraordinary self-reliance and the spirit of liberty. No rich soil, no crops of tobacco rewarded their hard labors. It was a struggle for existence during two generations. But they were brave, industrious, frugal and moral; they conquered nature when she was most unpropitious. Among them there were no distinctions of rank. They were too insignificant to excite the rapacity of royal governors. They were chiefly farmers, mechanics and fishermen who had few wants and ambitious aspirations, with a sprinkling of educated men who took their place naturally as leaders, but all animated by the same sentiments, among which the fear of God was preeminent—a noble race to lay the foundation of prosperity and power. Progress of settlement was slow but sure. There were no drawbacks, as in Virginia. The word sent back by the Plymouth Colony to their Puritan friends in England resulted in a further emigration in 1628, and the founding of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay; and the settlements spread. The Puritans were honest in their dealings with the Indians, with whom they remained at peace until jealousies among the Indians themselves incited war upon the settlers. Then the English fighting blood aroused and conquered a bloody peace, lasting for half a century. After that, expansion brought conflict, and the Indians were driven westward. The New England Colonists elected their own governor and magistrates, and in their town-meetings freely expressed their sentiments. For a hundred years they produced few distinguished men except ministers. They knew but little of what are called fine arts, either music, architecture or painting. No sciences received an impulse from them, and no literature except sermons. Socially they were not interesting, being narrow and bigoted and indifferent to amusements. But they all were taught the rudiments of education and independence of mind. In fervent religious life they never were excelled by any people on the face of the earth. Nor in individual sense of duty were they ever surpassed. The difficulty of earning a living on a sterile soil prevented the accumulation of property, and perhaps led them to attach undue value to money. Their frugality and poverty made them appear parsimonious. Their whole history is a refutation of the theories of Buckle, as also is life in Scotland, Switzerland and Northern Germany.

The colonization of Canada (New France) by the French, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware, by Dutch and English, resembled in the main that of New England rather than that of Virginia and the Carolinas. But all the colonists, north and south, were exposed to the same outward dangers in the hostility of the various Indian tribes. So far as they have a common history, it was incessant conflicts with the aborigines, on whose hunting grounds the white men encroached, until the Indians were exterminated or driven to the west—a sad record of injustice and wrong to be palliated only by seeming necessity. It was the old story of the warfare between barbarism and civilization. William Penn’s experience in successful dealings with the Indians by means of just and equitable negotiations show that the whole black record of the white man’s oppression of the Indian has been utterly needless—the outgrowth of greed.

It was not until the 18th century that the Colonies, whether French or English, can be said to have had any notable history, and even this is meagre—struggles with colonial governors, warlike expeditions through a pathless wilderness, religious persecutions, the extension of frontier settlements, theological quarrels, political theories, all of which favored growth and development, but which produced no historic names, except of theologians like Jonathan Edwards. No great character arose who gave a new political direction to colonial growth. There were no great events which either interest or instruct us until the Seven Years’ War in Europe led to a contest between the English and French settlements, resulting in the fall of Louisburg, through the bravery of New England troops led by Sir William Pepperell, a Kittery merchant, and the conquest of Canada under the inspiration of William Pitt, when James Wolfe was the hero. It was in this war that the colonists first distinguished themselves, fighting for the mother-country rather than for their own interests; that Washington, the greatest name in our history, first appeared upon the way, as an aide to the brave, but obstinate and unfortunate, General Braddock.

The result of this war was to destroy the prestige of English soldiers, and to fan a military spirit in the colonies. It taught the raw American militia self-reliance, and incited a passion for national independence. The colonists numbered now nearly four millions of people, wearied by English rule, ambitious to become a nation, and bound together by the ties of interest. As yet no light in science had arisen except Benjamin Franklin, no distinguished literary men, no poets or historians, no great political writers, no lawyers even, except of local fame. Books were scarce and dear, and newspapers few. There was not a merchant in the country whom we now should consider rich, probably not a single millionaire from Portland to Charleston. The richest men were the planters of Virginia and South Carolina; and even the foundations of their prosperity were being undermined by negro slaves and the fall in the price of tobacco—the great staple of Southern industry. The ambitious residences of the planters, built in imitation of baronial halls, were falling into decay, and their vast estates were encumbered and mortgaged, which led to the rise of a class of lawyers for the collection of debts, such at Jefferson and Patrick Henry in their early career, and also to the increase of the yeomanry, neither rich nor poor, among whom was developed the passion for liberty and opposition to royal governors, as seen in the Virginia House of Burgesses.

Twenty years of peace followed the Seven Years’ War, but they were not years of rest. It was a period of agitation and discontent. Political theories interested every class, who now began to catch glimpses of the future extension of the country. It was also a period of great material prosperity. The fisheries of Newfoundland were a source of profit to the people on the New England coast, as well as a colonial trade. Lumber and fish were exchanged in the West India Islands for molasses and rum—a new enterprise, which demoralized as well as enriched. Land was cleared of forests and cultivated from the East coast towns to the Hudson river and beyond; and the population, chiefly consisting of farmers, who still remained poor, was yet independent and intelligent. Beautiful villages arose on the banks of every river and at the base of hills. The fear of Indians passed away. Some fine houses were built in the larger towns, and luxuries to some extent were enjoyed by country merchants and the professional classes. Colleges and academies arose, to which resorted the sons of prosperous farmers. Mechanics acquired skill, and some articles which were formerly imported were manufactured in a rough way.

But the most marked feature of the time was political agitation and a desire to be free from the mother-country. This, indeed, was not avowed nor everywhere desired; but there was a growing impatience of restraints imposed by the English Government, and the haughty tone of Colonial governors and judges who were appointed by the Crown. In town meetings the principles of liberty were discussed. Much was written on the imposition of taxes toward the support of the English Government, weakened by the Seven Years’ War. The popular orators, like Samuel Adams, James Otis and Patrick Henry, declared that the people could not be taxed without their own consent. Some supported this doctrine from those abstract rights which appeal to consciousness, and others from the constitutional history of England. Nobody felt the burden of the taxes imposed, but everybody believed that the precedent of taxation would be abused until it became oppressive. Public sentiment, however, was nearly unanimous that taxation by Great Britain was an infringement on liberties and charters, which were to be defended as sacred. But I am inclined to the belief that opposition to English taxation was based on the secret desire to be free from England altogether as much as on fear of oppression—at least, among the leaders of agitation, like John Adams, who clearly saw the inevitable extension and future power of the Colonies, especially if united. The spirit of the Colonies from north to south was aggressive, bold, independent, fearless, with a probable exaggeration of their military strength, natural to people who lived so far away from the great centers of civilization, and accustomed to self-reliance amid the dangers which had menaced them for, more than a hundred years.

Hence arose the American Revolution, not merely the most important event thus far in American history, but one of the greatest events in the history of the world, in view of the remote consequences. The Colonists were very poorly prepared for a contest with the greatest power in Europe, but they rushed into it with the utmost enthusiasm; their earliest resistance was successful, and the British troops, mostly veterans, were driven from Boston, to the immense astonishment and chagrin of the English government, which expected a ready submission. Yet resistance would not have been successful if the defence had been made in Europe, with its good roads and means of transportation for regular troops. It was so in America rather by reason of the impassable wilderness which skirted the settlements than the military strength of the Colonists. Nor would independence probably have been then achieved had it not been for the transcendent abilities, patience and patriotism of the leader whom Providence pointed out for them. Though defeated in almost every battle, and driven from one position after another, leading almost the life of a fugitive, with a feeble band, like David in the Wilderness, the heroic Washington persevered long after success had given way to crushing disaster, amid great obstacles, with treason among his followers, slanders and popular discontents; without money and with scarcely any military equipments for his raw militia, until his cause was won—and won more by taking advantage of the difficulties which nature imposed on the enemy than by the skill and bravery of his own troops. Without him for a leader, with jealousies and rivalries on the part of generals and politicians, and growing apathy on the part of the people, who, as the war went on, tardily and reluctantly enlisted, and then only for short periods, the contest would have been at least prolonged, like that of the Greek revolutionists; and if France had not come to the rescue—not from sympathy with a struggling people so much as from the desire to cripple its ancient and implacable British foe—the cause might have been given up in despair until fought for again in a succeeding generation.

The whole conflict to a thoughtful and religious mind has the significance of a providential event, or of manifest destiny to those who claim to be philosophical and who cast their eyes on the immense resources which were sure to be developed at no distant day in the unsettled wilderness which stretched from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

As we speculate on the results of this memorable contest, we are compelled to notice the special attractions which a free country has held out for emigrants from the old States of Europe: the unbounded facilities for the poor man to earn a living and even to become rich; the increasing openings for enterprise of all kinds; the vast expanse of public lands to be entered upon; the legal facilities for acquisition, sale and purchase of land—diametrically opposite in policy to the conservative restrictions in the old countries; the unparalleled and rapid increase of population, doubling every twenty-five years; the resistless tide of emigration toward the Ohio and Mississippi, and finally to the Pacific Ocean; the universal sense of security in the new settlements, and the feeling of nationality which has animated and united the whole population.

With political unity and the advance of material interests leading to wealth and power, we do not see, it must be confessed, a corresponding progress in morals or eminent attainments, in literature and science. The untoward influences retarding this higher growth began very early. The war of the Revolution relaxed the social restraints which Puritanism had favored. The disbanded soldiers were neither so temperate nor industrious as their fathers, and the vices of drunkenness and profanity became alarming even in the land of steady habits, to say nothing of the looseness in religious opinions. The old Calvinistic divines were succeeded in many parishes by more indulgent ministers who preached short sermons of ethical platitudes, forgot pastoral duties and had a keen eye to professional interests, while many a sturdy farmer added Jamaica rum to his supposed necessities, and ended by putting a mortgage on his paternal lands.

Scarcely had the United States started on their career of prosperity after their successful struggle with England when they were exposed to a new danger, from the reluctance of many States to adopt the Constitution which the wisest and greatest statesmen of the land had framed in Philadelphia, in 1787. John Fiske has well called this "the critical period in American history." There were in the Constitutional Convention every variety of opinion, and incessant debates. There were fifty-five men in all, representing the different States. Among the more illustrious were Franklin, Washington, Hamilton and Madison. Differences arose as to the ratio of representation, the mode of election of President and the powers to be delegated to him, the functions of the two legislative Houses and the election of members, the Federal courts and commercial regulations. There was an obvious antagonism between the North and South, and between the larger and smaller States, as to representations. There were angry discussions whether slaves should be considered property or persons. Some leaned toward a centralized government, after the manner of monarchial institutions, and others to extreme democracy. After four months of toil some compromises the Constitution was signed, as the best that could be made under the circumstances. And although, at the time, it satisfied no one in all its parts, it has been characterized as the most admirably written constition ever formulated, at once the simplest, the most elastic, the best adapted to the circumstances for which it was prepared.

The next thing was to get it ratified,—but some of the States stood aloof, especially New York. This called out Jay, Hamilton and Madison in a series of able papers called The Federalist—an immortal State document which seemed to turn the balance, and the constitution was saved, subject to future amendments.

Then followed the election of President, and such was the universal veneration for Washington, respect for his abilities and gratitude for his services, that he was unanimously elected—the wisest choice that could possibly be made, since the nation was safe under his guidance.

His administration was not marked by stirring events, but by great sagacity. It was memorable for the formation of the two great political parties which, under different names, have since divided the nation, the Federalists, and the Republicans or Democrats—the one led by Hamilton and the other by Jefferson. The Federalists aimed at greater centralization of Federal power; the Republicans—so-named after the French republican clubs—leaned to State sovereignty. The first party was composed chiefly of the professional and educated classes, merchants, and men of high social position; the second embraced the common people and their ambitious leaders who sought extension of the suffrage—a party which continually increased until political power fell into its hands, never afterward to be lost, until their democracy made itself a tool of the slave-holding aristocracy. Washington received a second election, and when his term of office closed he gladly retired to his beloved Mount Vernon, and in a few years died, leaving the most unsullied fame than any man of modern times has earned.

His successor, John Adams, had rendered great services, both before and during the revolution, in advising and assisting his countrymen to shake off English domination; he had been an efficient, though not remarkable diplomatist in Holland, France and England; and was an honest and patriotic statesman, an industrious legislator, an effective public speaker, a brilliant conversationalist and letter writer, with the only drawback of a hasty, irascible and disputatious temper, and great personal vanity. He was a Federalist like Washington, and made few removals from office. He retired reluctantly from his high position and withdrew to Quincy to nurse his resentments, especially against Jefferson, the successful rival who succeeded him in the Presidency, having been elected to it by the Republican or Anti-Federalist party.

The eight-years’ administration of Jefferson, like those of Washington and Adams, was not fruitful in matters of historical interest, but was marked by great public prosperity. Jefferson was a philosopher and a man of peace, and although provoked almost beyond endurance by the injuries which France and England continued to inflict on American commerce, and by the impressment of seamen and hostility to the United States, yet he abstained from plunging the nation into war. He made a great mistake in his "embargo", which pleased only those who had no ships to rot on the wharves, without inflicting serious injury on British manufactures, and he made himself ridiculous by his gunboats as a means of national defence. With him anything was better than war. And here he was probably right, considering the defenseless state of the country with all its financial embarrassments. His great aim was to pay off the national debt, and develop industries. But he was hostile to a national bank and Federal tariffs on foreign goods for protection to domestic manufactures. He threw his influence into measures for the welfare of farmers rather than of manufacturers and merchants. As his party had acquired undisputed ascendency, old political animosities died out. Although a Democrat (as the Republican party had come to be called), succeeding a Federalist administration, he made very few removals from office. His policy was pacific and conciliatory, and his popularity increased with the national prosperity. He was the most long-sighted of all American politicians, seeing that political power hereafter would be lodged with the common people, and he adapted himself to their wants, their prejudices and their aspirations.

Though born on a plantation, he was democratic in his sympathies. He was no orator like John Adams; indeed, he could not make a speech at all; but he could write public documents with masterly abilities, and was fond of writing letters. His greatest feat was the purchase of Louisiana from France, but his administration was most memorable for departing from the policy of Washington and Adams, in breaking away from the courtly formality and dignity of official life and inaugurating an era of popular "republican simplicity." The day of strong Federalism in government gave way to the reactionary Democracy. Jefferson was an original thinker and a natural opponent of authority, whether in politics or religion. For his own epitaph he described himself as "Author of the Declaration of Independence and of the statute of Virginia for religious freedom."

Jefferson bequeathed to his successor, Madison, the responsibility of settling the growing difficulties with Great Britain. Madison was the disciple, admirer and friend of Jefferson, through whose influence he had been weaned from Federalism, which originally he had adopted. He, too, one of the most able statesmen of the times, and one of the most enlightened, would have kept the country from drifting into war had that been in his power. He clearly saw that the nation was unprepared—that it had neither an army or navy of any size; but the unabated insults of the English government, the continual injuries it inflicted on American commerce, and its haughty and arrogant tone in all negotiations, were infuriating Congress and the American people. It became clear that war was simply a choice of evils—that the nation must either submit to humiliation and dishonor, or risk disaster, the defeat of armies and the increase of the national debt. The war of 1812 was without glory on the land, being a miserable series of blunders and misfortunes on the part of generals, and without results at all gratifying to American pride. And it was also regarded as unnecessary by those who were most injured by naval depredations. It was popular only among those who lived in the interior, and who cherished the traditions of Bunker Hill and of Yorktown. Its calamities were indeed partially redeemed by naval successes, which shed renown on such captains as Decatur, Barron and Bainbridge. It might have been more successful if the whole people had been united in it, to accomplish a distinctive practical object, as in the French and Indian War when Canada was conquered, or in the Revolutionary struggle for liberty. But it had no specific aims except to vindicate national honor. As such it was not without important results. It convinced England, at least, that the Americans would no longer be trifled with, and that all future hostilities, whichever way they terminated, would inflict evils without corresponding benefits. The war doubtless gave a great stimulus to the infant manufactures of the country, and various kinds of industries, since the people were driven to them by necessity, and thus helped to build up New England in spite of its ruined commerce. The war also scattered wealth and inflated prices, All wars have this effect; but it demoralized the people like the Revolutionary War itself, notwithstanding the great bonus it bestowed.

Both countries were glad when the war terminated, for both were equal sufferers, and, to all appearances, gained but trifling advantages. In the peace which was consummated at Ghent, of which John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay were the chief negotiators, nothing was said about the injuries which provoked the contest, but they never were forgotten, and the United States were doubtless put on a better footing with foreign powers. From that time national progress was more rapid than before, and all classes settled down to peaceful prosperity and to improving their condition.

The only event of importance which occurred during Madison’s administration, after the close of the war, was the cession of Florida to the United States in 1819, negotiated by John Quincy Adams, but opposed by Henry Clay. The latter great man had now become one of the most prominent figures in American politics, and his entrance upon the political arena marked the growing importance of Congress in the domestic affairs of the country at large. From this time the abler statesmen in the National Legislature obtained by their debates a greater prominence in the public eye than even the Executive itself.

This was true especially during the administration of Madison’s successor, Monroe, who was more distinguished for respectability than eminent abilities—the last of the "Virginia dynasty". His name has been particularly associated with a declaration made in his message to Congress in March, 1822, that, "as a principle, the American Continents, by the free and independent position they have assumed and maintained, are henceforth not to be considered as subjects for future colonization by any foreign power." This is known as "the Monroe Doctrine", although it should probably be credited to John Quincy Adams, Monroe’s Secretary of State.

During the times of "good feeling" and absence of party animosities which marked the administration of Monroe, two great men, Daniel Webster and Henry Clay, appeared in the halls of Congress destined to make a mark in the domestic history of the nation, And there was one event which happened during the same period, the political consequences of which were of great importance, the work of these rising statesmen rather than of the President. This was the famous Missouri Compromise, marking the first conflict between slavery and freedom—a question which thenceforward dwarfed all other subjects of national interest. Hitherto the great question had been kept in the background, but in 1818 a bill was introduced into Congress proposing the admission of Missouri into the Union, which when it reached the Senate was amended by Mr. Tallmadge of New York, providing that slaves should not be further introduced into the State. Angry discussions followed, and although the amendment was adopted, the question was not lost sight of, but for two years engaged the intensest interest of Congress and the public, until in 1821 a compromise was effected by Henry Clay, by which slavery was forever excluded from United States territory north of 36° 30 of latitude, and west of the western boundary of Missouri. This admitted Missouri as a slave State, but drew the line of demarcation at that.

The administration of John Quincy Adams, Monroe’s successor, was unmarked by important political events, and he quietly continued the policy of his predecessor, making but few removals from office. He had been a Federalist, but swung around to the Republican or Democratic party. No one since Washington was so little of a partisan as this President, and no one was ever more conscientious in the discharge of the duties of his office. But he was not popular. Neither his habits nor opinions gained him friends, while they created many enemies, the most implacable of whom was General Jackson, who considered himself cheated out of the Presidency by a supposed coalition between Adams and Clay, on which he harped to the day of his death.

In 1829 the public career of John Quincy Adams apparently closed, but his best days were yet to come as the champion of human freedom in the House of Representatives. His most distinctive trait of character was moral heroism. He had a lofty self-respect which prevented him from conciliating foes, or rewarding friends; an old Puritan, sternly incorruptible, disdaining policy in the inflexible sense of duty and personal dignity, learned without genius, eloquent without rhetoric, experienced without wisdom, and religious without orthodoxy, yet securing universal respect from his austere integrity and undoubted patriotism, the last of the great statesmen, except the military heroes, who reached exalted rank from the services he had previously rendered.

The elevation of Andrew Jackson to the Presidency was memorable for a new departure in the political history of the United States. He was a man of remarkable force. Born poor, he had, almost without friends, made his own way, becoming lawyer, Congressman, United States Senator, Judge of the Supreme Court of Tennessee, volunteer militia officer, Major-General and Department Commander, and Governor of Florida. He had rendered undoubted services in the war of 1812, especially by his brilliant victory at New Orleans, and he also had shown considerable ability in conflicts with the Indians, which gave him great popularity. But he was accused of being ignorant, prejudiced, unscrupulous, and selfwilled. He began his administration by making the members of his Cabinet his tools or clerks, and giving his confidence to a few unofficial admirers, called the "Kitchen Cabinet". So far as he was ruled at all it was by these "machine politicians", whose policy was a division of the spoils of office. At the start Jackson foolishly quarreled with nearly all the members of his Cabinet, because their wives would not associate with a woman of inferior social position who had married the Secretary of War. Next, he turned out most of the office-holders whom his predecessors had appointed, who were not his partisans, on the infamous doctrine: "To the victor belongs the spoils", a movement which unfortunately became the policy of his successors of all parties, as a party measure. This course cannot be sustained by justice or by argument from experience, either in conserving party strength or advancing official efficiency in charge of the national interests. It causes intense hatreds and bitter disappointments. Jackson made ten times more removals in one month than all his predecessors had done before him, and this without regard to fitness for office, but avowedly to reward partisans, in a time of intense political partisanship.

It was not long after his inauguration before Jackson became involved in a quarrel with the United States Bank. The notes of this bank were as good as gold, and it had proved useful in the regulation of the currency, in fact, a necessity which had the confidence of business men throughout the country. Under the pretense that it was an engine of political corruption the President waged an uncompromising war until he effected his purpose of crippling it. I need not detail the financial troubles which ensued, when the great central bank, the Federal balance wheel of all money operations, was stopped, and when, State banks—called "Pets"—sprung up everywhere, without sufficient capital, to which the public funds were intrusted until they all burst together in the financial crash of 1837, and the general suspension of specie payments. In justice I must add that this crash was not caused wholly by the winding up of the United States Banks but largely by an enormous inflation of paper money—in the craze for universal speculation, to which everybody was tempted by the prosperity of the country, arising from its rapid settlement and development.

But more important than the President’s war on the United States Bank was the compromise tariff of 1833, which led to the greatest series of debates ever seen before in the halls of Congress, and in which Clay, Webster, and Calhoun were the parliamentary giants. The United States Senate never has had such famous debates as during the administration of General Jackson. He seemed to call out all the bitter hostilities which had been buried since the times of Jefferson. The extraordinary ability which was developed at this time in both Houses of Congress, but especially in the Senate, was directed to everything of national interest. Into all political subjects did statesmen cast their fearless eyes—questions of finance, political economy, internal improvements, manufactures, commerce, and Indian difficulties. Congressional legislation during the memorable eight years of Jackson’s rule is exceedingly interesting. The opposition was conducted by the Whig party, successors of the Federalists, friends of the United States Bank, of a tariff involving protection to infant industries, and generally of what the Democrats opposed. The whig press was wonderfully active, not only in discussing public measures, but in caricaturing public men, especially the President himself, who acted from the counsels of his own will alone, while everybody approved or must submit to the penalty of his displeasure.

The debates on the tariff settled nothing. What question of political economy ever was settled, any more than doctrines of theology? For more than half a century our legislators have attempted to solve this puzzle—whether a tariff should be imposed for revenue only, or for the protection of various industries—but the question was probably never more ably discussed than by Clay, Calhoun and Webster at this period. They showed themselves to be statesmen, like Sir Robert Peel and Gladstone, rather than mere politicians such as have generally been elected to succeed them.

There is only one other Jacksonian subject to which the limits of this sketch will allow me to allude, and that is the nullification movement in South Carolina, which grew out of a jealousy of Northern growth and the tenacity of slave institutions, leading to the great parliamentary discussion in which Webster and Hayne were the combatants, To the credit of General Jackson that movement was summarily put down. In this affair the imperious military president—who was patriotically devoted to the Union—rendered an important public service, the result of which was to stave off the slavery contest until the country was better prepared for it. Moreover, it must be admitted that, stormy as was the administration of Jackson, and high-handed as were some of his most important measures, the country was seemingly never more prosperous. His sturdy will was serviceable also in favorable settlements of outstanding disputes with foreign nations—France, Spain, Naples and Denmark, besides some important foreign treaties. Nor was the country ever marked by grander popular agitations leading to an enlightened public opinion on national issues. The whole land was aroused with the eloquence of popular orators on almost every subject of human interest, and remarkably separated from questions of mere material welfare—discussions and lectures without end on slavery, on peace and war, on temperance, and on every other social reform. The platform, for a time, seemed to be as great a power as the pulpit or the press. The popular discussions of that day prepared the way for the higher grade of intellectual speakers who not many years after began to appear—the period when great lecturers arose like Everett, Holmes, Emerson, Giles, Beecher, Greeley, Sumner, Phillips, followed by Chapin, Whipple, Curtis and a host of others whose literary disquisitions were nearly as exciting as harangues on political and social questions. For a generation the platform held its own as a great popular power, and then gradually passed away, like other fashions useful in their day, to be succeeded by magazines and periodicals whose highest triumph is at the present time assisted by pictorial art.

Concerning the strife of parties and the succession of administrations after Jackson, I need say nothing. Ordinary political history, after all, is only a strand in the rope. True history embraces the development of agriculture and manufactures, of science, of art, of literature, of morals, and of religion as well—all social growth—a boundless field, which no historian can fully master.

The prominent element of interest in the history of the United States, from Jackson to Lincoln, is almost unwritten except in statistical tables, and that was, the marvellous expansion of the country in every respect. The tide of immigration set in from almost every European nation until it modified all forms of American life. Not merely the poor and the miserable, but the enterprising and adventurous sought the western continent to improve their condition, until the whole country was settled from the Atlantic to the Mississippi. The grain of mustard seed had become a tree for all the birds of the air. With the progress of emigration to the western States all kinds of industry had been developed. The country was getting rich; the national debt was paid off; colleges were being planted in every States; the primeval forests, where the red man had roved for a precarious support from his bow and arrows, had become fertile fields; cereals were exported to Europe to feed starving populations, while peace and plenty reigned in every section of the land. Never was a country more bountifully blessed. The reports of its wonderful fertility, its industrial resources, its mechanical inventions, especially in the application of steam to machinery, navigation and rapid transit, its philanthropical enterprises, its educational movements and its free institutions reached every corner of the Old World and turned the eyes of suffering peoples to this poor man’s paradise, where every facility was afforded for getting an honest living, unmolested by government enactments and the tyranny of caste.

The accidental discovery of gold in California in 1848 gave a fresh impulse to emigration, enterprise and ambition. Streams of western-bound transmigration crossed the Plains, passed the Rocky mountains and the great interior basis, and found lodgments all along the route, until the whole continent was opened up to colonists, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, with mines of untold wealth and every variety of fruits and cereals known to civilization; for the expanse of territory provided every diversity of climate, from seaboard to mountain-top, from the tropics to the ice; and this vast continent was peopled by a few people, under a centralized but almost unfelt government at Washington, of whose power the makers of the Constitution had never dreamed. Material life assumed a new aspect, and gigantic fortunes arose far exceeding those known to ancient aristocracies.

But there was one dark cloud which, amid this general prosperity, arose upon the horizon, giving intense solicitude to statesmen in Congress and the people in their assemblies, and this was the agitation caused by the persistent growth of negro slavery. This, little by little, entered more and more deeply into the minds of the people, and at last became a new political force of extraordinary influence. The eyes of the more thrifty and intelligent part of the nation were opened to the most monstrous absurdity that ever confronted the human intellect:—that from three to five millions of people were ground down by hopeless and bitter slavery under a Constitution which proclaimed unbounded liberty; and, further, that this bondage was intolerable, cruel, inhuman, hopeless—that there was no apparent remedy for the most disgraceful injustice under the sun, and that the mere agitation of the subject created bitter animosities among freemen themselves, and threatened National disunion. Gradually all other subjects of legislation paled before the tremendous issues which became obvious to every thinking mind. Even tariffs and internal improvements, which had been for forty years the leading subjects of discussion in Congress, lost their interest in comparison with the mighty evil which apparently was to divide the North from the South and make two rival and hostile nations instead of one united power. Congressional and even Presidential elections began to hinge on their connection with the slavery agitation. Those very men whom we now venerate as the most enlightened and philanthropic of patriots were maligned, slandered and persecuted, because they strove to enlighten the National conscience as to the evils of slavery. Animosities daily increased between statesmen from different sections of the country. The South looked with alarm and hatred upon all who advocated human rights, and with jealousy at the growing power of the free States, while the North beheld with astonishment and indignation the outrages which slave-owners inflicted on the most patient and gentle people who ever endured the yoke of bondage, and with apprehension saw them reaching out after more territory,—for, as the thriftless labor exhausted the soil, slavery must expand or die.

Such a state of things could not last amid the mighty commotions of the nineteenth century. The inevitable conflict must come. The blinded South would not listen to reason or humanity, and became the aggressor, with the main object of increasing slave territory and dividing the Union. In vain the eloquent memories of Clay and Webster, the adroitness of Douglas and Seward: Southern leaders, like Calhoun and Hayne, had prepared the Southern mind for disunion, under the plea of State sovereignty, which Southern politicians had ever advocated, forseeing difficulties which they dared not openly discuss. The extension and intensification of the contest over Kansas and the new States, the disruption of the Missouri Compromise in the interest of slavery, the growth of the anti-slavery sentiment in the North, and the election of Lincoln as President, were skilfully used to "fire the Southern heart" to overt rebellion; the guns of organized State treason at length fired upon the Federal Fort Sumter, and the mightiest contest of the nineteenth century was fairly opened.

It is not my object to present even the outline of that tremendous war, the details of which are narrated with accuracy and candor in the work before us, in the course of which such great names as Lincoln, Grant, Lee and others became prominent and immortal. What can be said in a few sentences of a contest which lasted four years and in which more than a million of men perished, and from five to eight thousand millions of dollars were expended? The sincere but misguided State patriotism of the South made a magnificent fight, and the triumph of the North was won not so much by superior genius and patriotic fervor as by its overwhelming strength, to which the Southern leaders had been blind because that strength was latent.

The life of any one of the prominent generals presents more material for history than the whole military career of Washington, and the short administration of Lincoln more than that of the united lives of all the previous Presidents. Who can present, within the narrow limits of an introductory essay, the patience, the fortitude, the sagacity and the patriotism of the man whom Providence raised up from humble life to guide the fortunes of a mighty nation? And who in a few lines can show the military genius of the great generals who brought the war to a successful issue?

What was this issue? It was the liberation of millions of slaves whose cries of despair had ascended to heaven. It was the wiping out of a national disgrace which insulted humanity. It was the preservation of a Union whose mission for good is infinite. It was the final elevation of the Southern half of the Anglo-Saxon population of American to an equality with the triumphant North, and the development of resources which Southern politicians never dreamed of in the most prosperous period of their old-time power. It was the opening up of Southern territory to trade, manufactures and industries which have almost revolutionized it. It was the burial of a subject of contention which had kept forty millions of people in perpetual conflict, and the removal of which left them free to pursue their wonderful career.

With the close of the Civil war a renewed and still more marvellous expansion of energies took place in every part of the land, and in every conceivable form. The increase in wealth and industries was perfectly amazing. The mind is bewildered by their contemplation. It is like surveying the stars rather than the moon. No intellect can grasp the mighty development in mines, in agricultural wealth, in commerce, in manufactures, in inventions, in steam navigation, in railways, in the electrical applications of power, in education, in philanthropy, in the erection of churches, in the endowment of colleges and schools, in the spread of liberal ideas. Even Canada may practically become an integral part of this great Anglo-Saxon empire. The little mountain stream is now a mighty river whole tributaries fertilize millions of square miles of soil as rich as the Babylonian plains. The little sapling at Plymouth Rock is now a tree whose branches conceal the heaven itself. Where is the end to be? What country has such sublime destinies? A generation has not passed away since the war without seeing the population of the country doubled, and its wealth, real and personal, increased to more than sixty thousand millions of dollars.

Thus are all events overruled for good. The war, which some thought would exhaust and ruin the country, opened channels of unexpected development. Thus is Providence prodigal of the sufferings and the lives of men, and still more of their wealth, to bring forth, out of disaster, blessings which could never be foreseen. This is the most impressive lesson which history teaches, seen alike in the struggles of ancient Greece and the conflicts of most modern nations—the everlasting burning of the world—phoenix to send forth undying hopes and bring about perpetual progress.

All this is the bright side of the picture. There is, alas! another side, fraught with great peril, bringing solicitude to every thoughtful mind.

All countries have peculiar dangers and difficulties to contend with, which sap the foundations of true National prosperity. In the old Roman world disproportionate fortunes, slavery, egotism and social vices undermined the moral health and prepared the way for violence. There was no material on which conservative forces could work. In some countries we find popular discontents, socialism, communism, nihilism, threatening and overthrowing established institutions. We see in other quarters combinations of labor against combinations of capital, fearful to behold, the end of which no mortal can predict. We notice in some nations an intolerable religious despotism, paralyzing energies and destroying all individual independence of mind, and in other countries the opposite evil—rampant infidelity, the destruction of religious faith, lax morality, and an insensibility to religious impressions. Some countries are nearly ruined by intemperance, and others by disgraceful licentiousness. Wherever we turn our eyes, there is something pregnant with dangers, and, seemingly, almost impossible to eradicate—all fatal to healthy development; seeds of ruin; sources of despair.

And storming our line of vision, in modern Europe we find the tremendous upheaval of the Great War due to the attempted rampage of military despotism, vast standing armies, the constant preparation for war,—due, too, to the moral degeneration of a people.

We have had our own dangers here in the United States. Please God, there is hope in our possible purification through the great struggle. No light dangers, these. One is the inordinate value attached to mere material wealth. Before 1914 and even after that if you discussed the destinies of America with a boastful optimist he would be very apt to speak of the inexhaustible mines of gold, silver, iron and other metals, enough to buy the industries of the whole word, and make the country rich, even if no wheat or cotton were exported to Europe. Or he would have pointed to the vast plains under cultivation, producing grain enough to supply almost all of the wants of Europe, after using all we need for ourselves. Or he perhaps would enumerate the miles of railway—twenty times more than would circle the whole earth, bringing every conceivable product of the land to the seaboard. He might have enumerated the millions of hogs slaughtered in Cincinnati, Chicago and Kansas City, the innumerable cattle which Texas sends to the east. Everything centered in his eye on material wealth, and the luxuries which wealth secured. When a foreigner traveled in this country not so long ago it was the vast and undeveloped resources of the West which most astonished him. The common eye saw chiefly the colossal production of the country, and gloried in the boundless results which were sure to reward miners, agriculturists, and manufacturers alike. It is this material life in which an immense majority seemed to have gloried as the highest object of desire. Hence there was the adoration of rich men, the only aristocrats whom society here recognizes, and in whom power seems to be centralized. There are philanthropists who found colleges; but even colleges are becoming more and more utilized for science to develop material forces—adapting their supply of learning to the material demands of the age. There are religious people who build churches; but these must be so expensively constructed and so splendidly decorated that poor people cannot afford to worship in them. Many are still ambitious to live in a fine house, and the wealthy rivalled the ancient Romans in the luxury of their tables and the gorgeousness of their furniture. It was these things to which most people "pointed with pride", as the political party platforms phrase it. Even political aspiration was cast aside for money. This unconscious admiration of material power was nearly universal, and was slowly demoralizing, because we put our trust in it as being our happiness and strength.

Our entrance into the war—the war for democracy against autocracy—brought us sharply to, so it seems to me. A fine spirit, the spirit of sacrifice, of love of country became prevalent everywhere, among the rich and the poor. Ideals became high, never were they higher. In one fell swoop, the false standards and beliefs of yesterday were washed away, leaving us cleansed and with the spirit of our forefathers.

After all, what are material riches? No matter how broad and how splendid a mere material civilization may be, it is built upon the sand. What is the body of a man? His soul only—himself—it is, that is precious and immortal. Whatever degrades the soul is a poison which destroys the body. Material glories are likely to blind us as to our true and higher destinies. Make New York a second Carthage, Philadelphia a second Antioch, Chicago a second Babylon, and Washington a second Rome, and we simply repeat the old achievements which ended in dismal failure. There is no reason, drawn from human experience, why this country should escape the fate of all other nations, not in the extinction of their population, but in the extinction of their glories—unless spiritual forces—such a force as moves us in this present epoch—shall arise which will counteract the downward tendency in morals and spiritual life. If America has a great mission to fulfill she must always put forth those agencies and proclaim those ideas which elevate the soul, and which will save other nations also. No stretch of territory, no richness of mines, no fertile fields of corn, no moneymaking mills are anything, in the loftiest aspect, if true life has fled.

And hence it is emancipating ideas and ideals and enlightened modes of education which should be the object of highest aim, if America is to fulfill its peculiar privilege in promoting the elevation and happiness of mankind. The final value of the discovery and settlement of America must be established not so much in feeding uncounted millions, to pass away like the leaves of the forest, as in creating new institutions and social conditions, which shall spread throughout the world. Thus only can we even conserve the glories of which we boast.

Another subject of solicitude to a patriotic American is the problem of what shall be done for the emancipated colored people of the South. That is a question peculiar to ourselves, and which we alone can solve. The rapid increase of the colored population may not endanger our institutions or affect the prosperity of the East and West. On the contrary, the unfortunate people whom we freed from bondage, and to whom we, perhaps unwisely, gave political rights, may yet be scattered throughout the land; and they will inevitably find the political and industrial level to which they became adapted, although social intermixture with the whites seems neither possible nor desirable; nor will they weaken the resources of the South, but will rather develop them. Yet their condition is most pitiable. Even Fred Douglass, in a lecture on their sad life, intimated, in my hearing, that, in spite of all that had been gained by many of them, the condition of the great mass was not substantially improved by emancipation—that they were still largely in the power of the whites; that they were still often oppressed, and miserable, ignorant and degraded, and might hereafter, with their rapid increase, become a dangerous element in our civilization.

Something ought to be done for a people who have been subjected to so great injustice. There is no apparent remedy for the increasing cloud of portentous evil but in their education, to make them citizens whom we fear not; and who is to educate them? They must be taught by those who are stronger and wiser. The Southern whites are slow to teach and help them, but at times even insult and isolate the philanthropic teachers who come to save them; although in many localities these old prejudices are passing away as the whites begin to see the higher worth of intelligent laborers. This is marked, for instance, with regard to the Hampton Institute for Negroes and Indians, some of the best friends of which are Southern men. The material wealth of the nation must be utilized in their favor—must be turned in a channel of goodness and benevolence. No feeble charity, no pittance of superfluous wealth, will avail anything. Donations large and free, not only of private but of public moneys—not thousands of dollars but millions—should be contributed to give them common schools, industrial training-schools and colleges; not directly to teach the masses of ignorant and depraved humanity, but especially to educate the better class of them, to raise up colored teachers who can best instruct their fellow-sufferers.

The boon which Abraham Lincoln conferred upon the slaves as a war measure will not turn out so great a blessing as was supposed, until some National aid for their further emancipation from ignorance and brutality shall be appropriated to their education by our National Legislature, as a national necessity.

Much the same line of thought applies to the remnants of our aboriginal Indian tribes who, as "Wards of the Nation," might well accuse us of a gross and gigantic breach of trust. The efforts making to educate the Indians, both in private and Governmental schools in the West and in the Hampton and Carlisle institutions in the East, give most encouraging results. They promise to fit these people for a reasonable use of the freedom and responsibility that will be theirs when the Government divides their land to them in individual severalty instead of by tribes, and when they put their nobler qualities of truthfulness and self-respect to work in the sphere of American citizenship.

We should not too harshly criticize our uncivilized "inferior races", for we ourselves have much to learn in the practice of Christianity, honesty and common fair dealing, when our Government, legislative and executive together, unites in making a "Chinese exclusion law", in plain contravention of existing treaties. That was done in the year of our Lord 1892.

The dangers which some deplore in immigration, in Mormonism, and in Roman Catholicism I fail to see, at least to any alarming extent. Immigration planted the West and developed its industries. Why should not the poor and miserable of foreign lands have a share in a boundless inheritance? It is not necessary that they should always be ignorant. They are as civilized as our remote ancestors, and they have as noble aspirations. They have already largely amalgamated with the Anglo-Saxon race. Mormonism is only a spot upon a sun, and must fade away with advancing light unless more deeply impregnated with evil than I am inclined to believe; while Catholicism has a mission to fulfill among people still enslaved by the dogmas and superstitions of the Middle Ages. Grasping as the. Catholics are of political power, it is because they had none in the countries from which they came, and their privileges are all the dearer from their former political significance. Every succeeding generation becomes more enlightened and more impressible by grand ideas. They are still the most religious, and in some respects the most moral, of all our colonists; and their priests are the most hard-worked and most self-denying of all our clergy—teaching, with all their prejudices and ecclesiastical bondage, the cardinal principles of the Christian religion. The Catholics may become a very powerful and numerous religious party, but they never can become a dominating power while faith remains in the agencies which have produced so wonderful a civilization as this, nor could the Pope encroach largely on civil freedom in this utilitarian age, even were he so disposed. Indeed, his utterances, as to both French and American affairs, seem to show a sagacious sympathy with the political tendencies of the day.

No picture can be true which does not show the shadows as well as the lights. We have had to look at some dark ones. But it is to be remembered that America is not a completed country. Much of the great prospect is chaotic, confused, unsightly, showing piles of dirt and accumulations of refuse material—like the building-ground of a huge edifice during construction. Such rapid advancement in nation-building was never made before on the earth, because all classes have been free and interested workers. We are in a transition stage, and even approximate perfection is a long way off. We may take courage, however, in the knowledge that not only is our edifice well founded—"broad-based upon a nation’s will"—but that, counteracting against the infelicities and tendencies to danger, is a new force arising among the builders—the thoughtful and the devotional alike—which is making more of conduct than of creed, more of piety than of institutional religion, more of individual character than of ecclesiastical form. This leaven is spreading with wholesome infection, and must find its sphere of work in arousing the multitude of individual consciences of American freemen to loftier standards of life and aspiration, in business, in all kinds of manual labor, in politics, in law-making and law-keeping—briefly, in good citizenship. It is much that a land has been found large and rich enough to raise its people out of the degradation of poverty to a higher plane of physical and social life, for morals and intelligence follow that. And there is great hope in the new popular movements in favor of education,—the Chautauqua Circles for home culture, the University Extension for giving collegiate instruction to non-collegiate youth, the libraries and reading clubs, the societies for political, literary and socialistic discussion, the literature-classes among women, and a great number of local associations for self-improvement and for the helping of others, from which radiate newer and better and loftier influences into all ranks of our people—even the very lowest. For among these a fresh zeal of Christian effort, aided by common sense, is carrying the light of physical cleanliness and comfort, together with moral and spiritual light. Moreover, the ancient civilizations, whose material greatness toppled them to their ruin, lacked two things that we rely on, free schools and an untrammeled press. Frequent political revolt tends to avert the more destructive armed rebellion; and the growing intelligence of our youth, with the atmosphere of free discussion into which they come up, will prove, under the influence of Christianity, a vital force to throw off evil as well as to propagate good.

I have but a word more to say, and that is on the dignity and utility with which the history of this great nation is invested. It will not be long before every university of Europe will have a chair to study and teach the development of our civilization. Such a wonderful progress in a hundred years cannot pass unnoticed by the students of the Old World. Even now the best treatises on our political institutions have been written by a Frenchman, a German and an Englishman, and are used as text-books in our own colleges. The field of American history cannot be exhausted any more than our mines of coal. Everyone who writes a school-book or an elaborate survey of the changes through which we have passed, everyone who collates a statistical table, or writes a treatise or a popular epitome of leading events, is a benefactor. Everyone who paints and analyzes a great character makes an addition to our literature. Even the honest and industrious expert who drags out of oblivion the driest and most minute details, is doing something to swell the tide of useful knowledge in this great country. Especially useful to the hardpushed student or the busy man must be any reasonably compact record of American life which presents the essential forces and facts that have produced results. Such a work should not only show the annals of political, military and industrial growth, but should note the characteristics of the various groups of colonists and the social, religious and civic elements that entered with influence into the formative periods of our composite national character. It should give at successive points analyses of the principles of republican government and their religious applications—from the town-meeting to the highest Federal department. It should, in brief, show not only the results and processes, but the reasons for them, and thus offer wholesome stimulant to the reader’s mind.

The excellent book to which this is a merely suggestive introduction, while it does not startle us by brilliant creative generalization nor enter upon critical speculations on disputed points, makes admirable use of accepted facts. It is clear in style, condensed though interesting in narrative, lofty in tone and truthful in statement. It is rather remarkable for its discriminating selection of events and influential elements to be set forth and for its lucid presentation of them. The account of our Four Hundred Years of American History should have a wide circulation, for it is a valuable contribution to the cause of education and popular instruction.

JOHN LORD.

Stamford, Conn.

About five hundred years before Columbus landed on Guanahani, one of the Bahama Islands, Lief Ericsson, a Scandinavian, sailed from Brattahlid, now New Herrnhut, in Greenland, in a due south direction, and after passing over sixteen degrees of latitude, or about 1,100 statute miles, sighted Newfoundland, and thence sailing southwest along the coast reached Cape Cod. Afterward other adventurous Northmen made voyages occasionally along the same coasts, from the tenth to the twelfth centuries. These explorers landed at several places; and records show that they attempted to found a colony in a region which they named Vinland.

The place selected for the settlement is supposed to have been somewhere within the boundaries of the present States of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, but every trace of the colony disappeared long before the advent of the English upon the same territory.

Meanwhile, an Icelandic collection of legends or sagas, which treat of these early discoveries, shows that explorations were made even as far south as Florida, in the vicinity of where St. Augustine now stands.

No marked influence was exerted by these discoveries and partial explorations, however, unless it may have been, as generally supposed, that an account of the voyages of Ericsson and others reached Columbus and stimulated him in his efforts to obtain the means of making an expedition of discovery toward the West.